Meanwhile, that activity among the French fur traders stirred up the old Company as all the home agitation could not. Each of the forts, Churchill farthest north, York on Hayes River, Albany, and Henley House up Albany River, Moose (Rupert lay dismantled these years) and Richmond Fort on the east side of the bay, were strengthened by additions to the garrisons of from thirty to fifty men. Each of the four frigates sent out by the Company had a crew of fifty men, among whom was one young sailor, Samuel Hearne, of whom more anon. Every year took out more cannon for the forts, more builders for Churchill, now a stone-walled fort strong as Quebec. Joseph Isbister, who had been governor at Albany and made some inland voyages from Churchill, was permanently appointed, from 1770, as agent at Quebec to watch what rival fur traders were doing; and when he died, Hugh Findlay succeeded him. A new house was rushed up on Severn River in 1756, to attract those Indians of Manitoba where the French were established. Lest other merchants should petition for Labrador, the Slude River Station was moved to Richmond Fort and Captain Coates appointed to survey the whole east coast of Hudson Bay, for which labor he was given a present of £80. Poor Coates! This was in 1750. Within a year, he is hauled up for illicit trade and dismissed ignominiously from the service; whereat he suicides from disgrace. Eight years later, Richmond Fort is closed at a loss of £20,000, but it has shut the mouths of other petitioners for Labrador. It is in 1757, too, that the Company inaugurates its pension system—withholding 5 per cent. of wages for a fund. As if Joseph La France’s journal had not been alarming enough, there comes overland to Nelson, in 1759, that Jan Ba’tiste Larlée, a spy whom the English engage and vote a wig (£1 5s) “_to keep him loyal_.”